For us, history is not in the textbooks. It is in our families. You probably have a name of a town or an old story told by your grandparents. But it is often hard to connect those pieces to the real historical map, to see the actual streets your ancestors walked, and to finally understand: Where do I fit in this story?

That is why I don't offer you a standard Jewish in Diaspora history class. My new project is a shared, lived experience.

I offer you a safe and welcoming space to bring your family myths, your doubts, and your questions. In our community, no question is too naive, too silly, or too scary to ask. We will look at your family's past and find the answers together.

This is a place for connection. You might even find someone in our group whose family walked the very same town's streets as yours. Bring your old photographs and your curiosity. I invite you to join our warm circle, find your town on the map, and finally piece your family’s story together.

For centuries, Ukraine was the undisputed heart of Jewish life. It was a place of great empires and shifting borders, where a single city could change its name and speak three different languages within just a few decades.

I created this program to travel through it place by place: Kyiv and Odesa, Lviv and Galicia, smaller and bigger towns of Bukovina, Volhynia, and Podolia.

Together, we will explore the incredible diversity of the Jews who lived here.

We will look closely at their daily lives: what their houses were built of, where they studied, and the synagogues where they prayed.

We will walk through noisy market squares, explore the rise of the Hasidic courts, feel the passion of early Zionists, and see how Karaites lived alongside mainstream Jewish communities.

We will uncover surprising, almost forgotten movements that once swept through these towns.

But this history is not just about shtetl life.

We will discuss the dramatic political events, the terror of Cossack uprisings, the devastating pogroms, and the brave Jewish self-defense groups that stood up to protect their streets.

We will trace the waves of migration and resettlement that eventually brought so many families to America, Canada, and the Land of Israel.

Finally, we will touch the 20th century — the immense tragedies, the survival, and what Jewish life in Ukraine looks like today.

I want us to travel together. Bring your questions, your family’s town name, and those old photographs you've kept for years. My goal is to help you find your ancestors' place in the Jewish history of Ukraine.

For so many of us, this is exactly where our own family stories begin — and it is time to finally piece them together.